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UNB Eaton Lecture to be held Nov 4 in Toronto

The Gregg Centre for the Study of War and Society at the University of New Brunswick is presenting the 2014 Eaton Lecture, Nov. 4, in Toronto. The lecture will be held at the Royal Ontario Museum's Eaton Theatre beginning at 7 p.m.

Entitled Canada's Hundred Days, 1918: Why Don’t Canadians Know About Their Greatest Victories?, the lecture will be given by Dr. Jack L. Granatstein, distinguished research professor of history emeritus at York University.

The battles of the Hundred Days Campaign drove Germany to peace, and they mark Canada’s decisive contribution to the final outcome of the war. Yet these battles remain unknown and unheralded in Canadian public consciousness. This year’s Eaton Lecturer, Jack Granatstein, will explore these critical moments of the Great War and Canada’s role in them.

The Eaton Lectures focus on Canadian military history and stewardship and complement the Gregg Centre’s mandate to study the nature of conflict and its impact on the world. The lectures are made possible by former UNB Chancellor and alumnus Fredrik S. Eaton, the Catherine and Fredrik Eaton Charitable Foundation, and John K. F. Irving.

Jack Granatstein is a keeper of Canadian history. He writes on 20th century Canadian national history — the military, defence and foreign policy, Canadian-American relations, the public service, and politics. He has been described as “the most prolific Canadian historian of his generation” with more than 70 titles to his credit.

For many Canadians, Jack Granatstein is best known for his television and radio work. He provided the historical commentary for CBC-TV’s coverage of the 50th, 60th, and 65th anniversaries of D-Day, V-E Day, V-J Day, the 90th anniversary of Vimy Ridge, and repeated Remembrance Day ceremonies alongside Peter Mansbridge.

A Toronto native, Dr. Granatstein attended Le Collège militaire royal de St-Jean and earned a BA at the Royal Military College, an MA at the University of Toronto, and a PhD at Duke University. He served in the Canadian Army from 1956 to 1966, then joined the history department at York University in Toronto where, after taking early retirement in 1995, he is Distinguished Research Professor of History Emeritus.

Dr. Granatstein has served as editor of the Canadian Historical Review and was a founder of the Organization for the History of Canada. He was also instrumental in creating a new home for the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, where he held the position of Director and CEO from 1998 to 2000.

An Officer of the Order of Canada since 1996, his many awards and honours also include seven honorary doctorates. In 2008, the Conference of Defence Associations awarded Dr. Granatstein its 75th Anniversary Book Prize as “the author deemed to have made the most significant positive contribution to the general public’s understanding of Canadian foreign policy, national security and defence during the past quarter century.”

Dr. Granatstein's better known titles include The Oxford Companion to Canadian Military History, Who Killed the Canadian Military?, Canada’s War: The Politics of the Mackenzie King Government, Canada’s Army: Waging War and Keeping Peace, and Who Killed Canadian History?

Dr. Lee Windsor, Deputy Director

Lee Windsor is Deputy Director at The Gregg Centre for the Study of War and Society at the University of New Brunswick and holds the Eaton Chair in Canadian Army Studies.

He has a BA(H) from Acadia University, an MA from Wilfrid Laurier University and a PhD from the University of New Brunswick. He teaches in the field of modern war, specializing in the Canadian Army experience. He is a former member of the West Nova Scotia Regiment and the 8th Canadian Hussars (Princess Louise’s).

His Gregg Centre duties today include facilitating Canadian Forces professional development and education through the Army’s Combat Training Centre at nearby CFB Gagetown. His current research projects centre on Canada’s role in two world wars as well as on post-war overseas commitments from the Sinai to Afghanistan. On behalf of UNB and the Canadian Battlefields Foundation, he regularly guides groups of students, soldiers and the general public on study tours to battlefields in Italy, France, Belgium and Holland. His publications include Kandahar Tour: Turning Point in Canada's Afghan Mission, Steel Cavalry: The 8th (New Brunswick) Hussars and the Italian Campaign, as well as a series of book chapters, articles and government reports

Dr. Marc Milner, Director

Dr. Marc Milner is best known for his books on the Canadian navy and on the Battle of the Atlantic, starting with North Atlantic Run in 1985, and most recently Battle of the Atlantic (2003 & 2005) which won the CP Stacey Prize. He has also edited several volumes, has published widely in scholarly journals, and writes a regular column on naval history for Legion Magazine.

From 1983 to 1986 Milner was an historian with the Directorate of History, NDHQ, Ottawa, where he worked on volume II of the RCAF's official History, and the new official history of the Royal Canadian Navy.

In 1986, Milner joined the History Department at UNB and from then until 2005 was Director of UNB's Military and Strategic Studies Programme. He has served as Chairman of the Canadian Military Colleges Advisory Board, Vice Chair of the Board of Visitors of the Canadian Forces College, has edited the journal Canadian Military History, seen over fifty graduate students to completion, and conducted study tours of European battlefields on behalf of the Canadian Battlefields Foundation and the Canadian Armed Forces. He is currently on the Board of Governors of the Royal Military College of Canada, and since 2006 has been Director of The Gregg Centre.

Dr. Milner's current research projects focus on the Normandy campaign of 1944. In addition to a volume for the New Brunswick Military Heritage Project book series titled From D-Day to Carpiquet: The North Shore Regiment at War, June-July 1944, his 2010 article in the Journal of Military History, “Stopping the Panzers,” won the Moncado Prize from the Society for Military History. His next book builds on that article, and a major long-term academic project titled "Normandy 1944: The Struggle for Meaning and Legacy" is underway which seeks to deconstruct existing assumptions about the campaign and create a new paradigm for understanding it.